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Blatter: Charges a smear campaign Posted: Saturday March 02, 2002 2:35 PMNICOSIA, Cyprus (AP) -- Sepp Blatter, the embattled president of FIFA, Saturday dismissed allegations of bribery and corruption as part of a campaign to discredit him before the May election in which he seeks re-election to the leadership of the world governing body of soccer. Addressing a news conference at the end of a visit to Cyprus, Blatter was at first reluctant to respond to questions about his handling of FIFA's finances and allegations of bribery to secure his 1998 election. "I am not speaking on the subject of the 1998 election. Everything I had to say has been said. The file has been closed also by the court in Zurich," Blatter said. Asked why the allegations were being revived now, Blatter said this was because he is seeking re-election to the FIFA presidency in May. No other candidate has officially declared with the election coming on the eve of the World Cup in South Korea and Japan. "I put it to you, this is because we are in an election year and there are, let's say, people who like to destabilize the actual president and also by defamation." It will all come to a head at an extraordinary meeting of FIFA's executive committee next Thursday. Blatter was forced to convene the meeting because 13 of the committee's 24 members demanded a full independent audit into the state of FIFA finances. "If there is anything further to say at that time I will say it," Blatter added. Claims by a senior African soccer official that he was offered money to support Blatter in the 1998 election aggravated an existing crisis over FIFA's huge financial losses following the collapse of its marketing arm, ISMM/ISL, last year. Britain's Daily Mail -- which broke the allegations earlier this week -- said Friday that the losses could be up to 10 times higher than the US$32 million FIFA acknowledges losing from the ISMM failure. "It's absolutely not true," FIFA spokesman Markus Siegler said of the Daily Mail claim. He reiterated Blatter's position that FIFA's books are in order and that demands by Lennart Johansson, the head of UEFA, the European soccer federation, for a further investigation are unwarranted. "All the figures have been presented in full length and details to the finance committee and the executive committee," Siegler said. "All of them were asked if there are any questions or come personally. You can have a look inside the books, no problem at all." ISL, a subsidiary of ISMM Group, negotiated FIFA's TV and sponsorship deals, including the television and marketing rights to the 2002 and 2006 World Cups. Its bankruptcy led to the cancellation of last year's World Club Championship in Spain and forced FIFA to set up its own in-house marketing unit. Even though Blatter has given repeated presentations to the executive committee, Johansson insists he is not satisfied that Blatter has been completely open about FIFA's finances. Johansson was an unsuccessful candidate for FIFA president in 1998 but is now suffering from prostate cancer and says he doesn't want the job. Farah Addo, a vice president of the governing body of African soccer, caused the latest uproar when he said Thursday that he was offered money to support Blatter in his race against Johansson. "I was offered US$100,000 in May 1998 to vote for Blatter by some campaigners from the Gulf -- including a former Somalian ambassador to a Gulf state," Addo said. Addo said he turned down the bribe. He claimed that officials from 25 nations, including 18 from Africa, had accepted bribes for votes. "I saw it with my own eyes," he said.
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